It had been beeping that the battery was low so I changed the battery. Now when I attempt to put it back on its bracket on the ceiling it goes off. As I live in a very populated area, I dont want this noise so I keep taking it back down and pulling the battery back out to stop it. Is this wrong? Will the detecter automatically go back off by itself? I have tried pushing the little button on it but that does not seem to help.
The X-10 system, originally marketed by BSR in the late seventies, still exists today. There's a horribly commercial, splashy, huckster web site selling the vast majority of the hardware online, but it's also carried by Fry's Electronics and a number of other brick-and-mortar outlets as well as (I'm told) Radio Shack. The X-10 standard is known worldwide. It transmits control information for lamps and appliances from pushbutton, wall switch, or computer-interfaced controllers over the power lines of your home or office to modules which are plugged in between the appliance or lamp and its power outlet. I have a CM-15A controller in my office, which connects to my PC via USB. I can configure lights and other modules to do what I wish either on a timed basis or in response to wall switch controllers I've placed. This works even with the computer shut down, once the control settings are loaded. I also have software from X-10 which interfaces with the CM-15A and can control it in response to commands over the internet. I can either log into the ActiveHome web site and talk to my CM-15 there, or I can use other third-party software on my PC to control it directly from a web interface, accessed from anywhere. There are lots of other interfaces and myriad open-source and third-party software solutions for Windows, Linux, and Mac OSX for controlling these X-10 interfaces. Some googling using the phrases home automation and x-10 open-source will get you a lot of very informative results. There are other home control systems out there products from Lutron and Insteon among them but by and large they're far more expensive. X-10, at $20 or so a module, is CHEAP and reasonably reliable when properly implemented.
Check and check out their X10 control devices. You can control every electrical device in your home from anywhere in the world. Not only manually turn things on and off but set schedules, etc.
